


Balancing the Scales

by Eleutherios



Category: Frozen (2013)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-14
Updated: 2014-05-14
Packaged: 2018-01-24 17:57:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,034
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1614119
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Eleutherios/pseuds/Eleutherios
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Life is a loan.  Eventually, the debt falls due.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Balancing the Scales

The Queen was dying.

People did not say this aloud, of course.  They avoided even thinking it, as if they could ward it off by paying it no heed.  They told each other that she was busy with affairs of state, meeting with dignitaries and keeping the peace.  This was why folk never saw her in the square anymore, why it had been so long since anyone had been invited to skate in the castle courtyard.  Before her illness, she had been much accustomed to walking or riding about the city at least once a week, usually early in the morning or in the late afternoon.  It was always a treat to see Queen Elsa riding past, glittering and fine.  Bakers stoking their ovens for the day would hurry out to bow as she went past, to receive her smiles, and lamplighters going about their work in the evening would pay their respects and be blessed by her in return.  During the winter social season, when rich and fashionable people would come to the capital from their country estates or even from overseas to attend balls and flutter about at court, she appeared more rarely but even then found time to walk about the winter fair every now and then, growing rosy with exercise and the light of the torches with people making courtesies as she went by and marvelling to see a young lady get on so fast.

Kristoff had noticed it first.  The others saw Her Majesty every day and so were not as aware of the changes she was going through, but when he returned from his two-month travels in the extreme North (where, it was said, night fell for six months of the year and refused to fall for the rest), he was shocked at her condition.  Although her smiles were beautiful as ever, she was a good deal thinner and paler.  Kristoff had never trained in medicine, but he could be as hard-headed as Anna when the mood was upon him and succeeded in ordering her to bed despite her protestations that she was perfectly well.  A week later, however, she privately confessed that she had an ache in her joints that would not go away, and often felt tired when she had not been exerting herself.  This was serious enough that Anna got to hear of it and sent for physicians.

Within two months, Elsa could not bear to leave her bed.  The doctors of the kingdom had no notion of what ailed her and could only give her drugs for the terrible aches she reported in her limbs.  The disease seemed to eat away at her, leaving behind a stark beauty of bleached skin and bone.  She could not walk without great pain and there were some days when she could barely swallow.  Anna took to sitting up with her in the night, and dark circles began to appear under her eyes that had not been there before.  It was more than fear for her sister that kept her up.  Elsa had not married nor produced an heir, and if she died now Anna would be Queen, and that thought terrified her more than the notion of life without a sister, although shame kept that secret locked inside.

Kristoff sent messages to every land calling for doctors and witches to come and heal Arendelle’s Queen, and they came.  From Agrabah came wise alchemists with scrolls of their queer, twisty writing and chests of rare spices.  From the Middle Kingdom came calm, courteous men and women with their long hair in topknots and their deep sleeves full of secrets, grinding herbs and brewing tinctures.  From Corona came Crown Princess Rapunzel herself, the Queen’s cousin, who was famous for her learning.  None of them could find a cure for her sickness, and all the while, she wasted away.

When the first ice creature came into the room, Anna  was inclined to shoo it away, but Elsa seemed pleased by its presence so she let it alone.  Elsa had made many ice creatures since taking the throne, each one imbued with a dab of her magic to keep it alive.  Ice was just more organised water, and water was very suggestible: it liked to take new forms, so giving it instructions like “live” was the simplest thing in the world.  This one was a butterfly, delicate as a snowflake, and indeed, it seemed to be a kind of living snowflake the size of a man’s hand.  The next day it came back with a friend, and they brought one of the ice stags, and before long, dawn saw a procession of ice animals making the long pilgrimage from the fjord or the mountains or the forests to the castle.

Queen Elsa died.  For the second time in her life, Anna put on deep mourning and sat by the deathbed for a day and a night while fantastical creatures of every description crowded about her in silence.

Finally, Olaf came.  The other ice and snow creatures made way for him, for they held him in special esteem.  He was the first living thing created by their maker, and in him she had placed the greatest part of her magic and herself.  Anna thought she should be glad to see him, but found the very sight of him irksome until he said to her, ‘Some people are worth melting for.’

Olaf took Elsa’s pale, limp hand.  Blue light flickered under her fingers, and it spread through Olaf and the rest of the creations Elsa’s hand had wrought over the years.  One by one, they crumbled into powdery snow or shards of ice until at last only Olaf was left, blazing like a sapphire star.  And then he too vanished, seeping into the carpet.  The blue light winked out in an instant and Anna was left in a freezing darkness.

In the gloom, she heard Elsa stirring.  Anna screamed for candles, for a lamp, anything, and the servants ran into the room to find their dead Queen sitting up, looking better than ever, if rather confused.

Elsa gave life to many creatures, and when she had needed it most, they gave it back.


End file.
